Letter: Illinois should look to neighboring states for budget help

Drastic pension cuts in SB1 by Speaker Madigan are overly harsh and mean spirited. Lack of funding by Illinois is largely due to Madigan's poor leadership. Current retirees are being punished with no recourse. People in their 70s and 80s are not prime candidates to get jobs. WEP requires that any...

Rockford Register Star

Writer

Posted May. 6, 2013 at 12:01 AM
Updated May 6, 2013 at 5:18 AM

Posted May. 6, 2013 at 12:01 AM
Updated May 6, 2013 at 5:18 AM

Drastic pension cuts in SB1 by Speaker Madigan are overly harsh and mean spirited. Lack of funding by Illinois is largely due to Madigan's poor leadership. Current retirees are being punished with no recourse. People in their 70s and 80s are not prime candidates to get jobs. WEP requires that anyone who earns social security be limited to 40 percent of the amount they would have earned since they have a state pension.

Illinois should look at neighboring states. Indiana requires state workers to pay part of their health insurance. If workers smoke, they pay an additional $100 a month. Support is given to those who try to quit. If state workers or retirees have regular physicals and submit the test, weight and height results to an outside group designated by the state (the employer will not have access to the information), with medical advice to assist with cholesterol etc… health insurance is reduced.

In Indiana and Wisconsin, employees pay in more for their pension and social security while the states pay in their share every year! Unlike Illinois which has only paid 100 percent of its share once since Governor Stevenson's tenure in the 1940s. Is there any reason we're in a mess?